We've landed!!

Wow...what an incredible journey!  It is so weird to think that we left home a little over 24 hours ago!  Couldn't leave without a Mocha Coconut Frappacino though!!!

After a fairly uneventful flight (which is a good thing!), we landed in Tel Aviv this morning at 7:00am local time.  This was however, midnight according to our body clock.  But even with little sleep our group pushed on!  We met our tour guide, Shimon, who is, according to himself (as well as some other reputable sources) the best tour guide in Israel.  He has a light sense of humour and is very knowledgeable about his country and it's history.  SO...what did we do today???

We visited Caesarea, and discovered the palace the King Herod built.  The various details are fascinating and too many to write down, but his accomplishments were incredible, even though slightly delusional!    The pictures we took do not do the magnitude of this place any justice at all.

This picture is looking from the theatre over the remains of the palace.  The long stretch of sand is the "hippodrome" (no, not for hippos!!!) where the King would watch chariot races, and beyond that lies more palaces and buildings which were eventually taken over during the Crusades.

I think this picture is really cool...this is one of 3 "detainment" cells where Paul was kept in prison for 2 years.  It was in this cell that Paul wrote his letters that are now part of the Bible.  To think that so much of the New Testament was written and inspired right here!  I just wanted to sit down on the dirt too.

 Here I am looking like I have been up 24 hours, flown on a plane for 11 hours, and eaten breakfast at 4am.  I'm standing in the hippodrome (no comment), which just happens to be the first place the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners were awarded for their efforts by standing on podiums...just like we still do!

OK, so this is also pretty cool.  Up until 2 years ago, this place was covered in sand.  They had a major storm and these mosaic carpets began to appear (the darker shape in the centre).  Archaeologists are currently working to uncover and restore what they find.

From there we visited Jaffa, where we ate Shwarma for lunch, and drank an Israeli Coke...definitely not a Canadian Coke!  It reminded me of going to the Coke Museum in Atlanta and tasting all the different Coke that is served around the world, except I left the museum with a stomach ache, and I felt just fine after lunch here :)  Jaffa is a beautiful little town, now called an "Artist Colony" - lovely little artists shops in buildings whose walls could tell a few stories...if only they could talk.

FINALLY, we made it to our hotel back in Tel Aviv.  We were all exhausted from not sleeping, walking in the sun, and having had too little to eat.  We were so thankful to crash onto our beds for a bit!  Andrew and I took a walk along the beach of the Mediterranean Sea.  The sand is beautiful and the water refreshing.  The breeze blowing off the sea was so refreshing after the heat of the day.  The humidity here is crazy - everything feels wet...the carpets, the beds, the sand (and my hair is a frizzy disaster!!!  Good thing for the hat!!)  Here is a picture of Andrew at the beach...and just so you can fully realize how westernized Tel Aviv is, a little taste of "home".

An awesome first day!  Tomorrow we head to Mount Carmel and to Nazareth, both places and stories I would love to retell.  I really do wish the old walls of these places could speak.  Oh, to know what they saw, the people whom they protected, and the lives that grew up within them.  A fascinating journey!